The beginning of all things birthday.

Gracie’s tenth birthday (TENTH! 10th!!) isn’t until Saturday, and she doesn’t know it, but the festivities are about to start. Auntie Kim boards her plane in a few hours to start her trip down here to Tejas to surprise Gracie-girl. I know! A secret birthday trip! We’re the coolest!

Okay, really Auntie Kim is flying down for the weekend to start landscaping my yard – something that is way past hella too hot to do in August when she’s usually here. Specifically, we’ll be building a firepit and surrounding lounge area. Something we’ve been thinking about for awhile, but I like to look at it as a gift for making it through a decade of raising kids without losing one of them. (For long. Heh.) When we started planning which weekend Kim would venture down here, we looked at Easter weekend – extra day off + no kids = more accomplished – but it was a great deal more expensive. Then we thought about how my rotten, spoiled child had complained that no one is ever here for her birthday; Auntie Rhi is here for Bee’s birthday at the end of June, and Auntie Kim is here for my birthday when she comes back with us in August, but no one is here for her birthday in April. Ever. (You know – because we’re mean and we do that on purpose.) The wheels started turning and the stars all lined up in pretty patterns.

Now we just gotta hope that Bee-girl can hold out for a few more hours. Because we told her. Bee can’t keep a secret to save her life, but we keep trying. Hey, we figure she’s gotta learn sometime, right? And middle-kidhood is good for that. In any case, she found out and I’ve been reminding her ever since not to give Gracie any clues, or say anything about it, or tell her she’ll like what’s at home, or anything. She can’t react at all. Because as bad as Bee is at giving REALLY OBVIOUS CLUES, Gracie is that good about thinking around corners. In other words, we’re doomed and I can’t believe no one has figured this out yet.

So tonight I’ll leave work a lil early, grab Kim from the airport, race over to the store to look at rock and stone and grab a few supplies, and then scramble back home before the kiddos. If all goes well, Gracie will walk in and Auntie Kim will just be there.

Man, not knowing might be the way to go with this one – I have ants in my pants already!